


Return

by WestOrEast



Category: Parahumans Series - Wildbow
Genre: Alternate Universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-27
Updated: 2020-11-27
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:40:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,264
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27731665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WestOrEast/pseuds/WestOrEast
Summary: It's been less than a year after the end of the world and life's still going on. Lisa's doing her best to make the world better and get some of the goods for herself as well. And then things change.
Comments: 12
Kudos: 94





	Return

  
“ _Because I think you have a chance to come back from this. Not much of a chance. Part of that rides on me. I could help you, or I could stop you from troubling anyone ever again. Part of that? It’s up to you to win the fight, to take control and keep the administrator from claiming everything you have, leaving you a shell._ ”

I felt a chill. Was part of it my passenger? Both of us?

I opened my mouth to reply, and I couldn’t.

Didn’t deserve to, either way.

“ _It’s okay. I got the answer, myself._ ”

I looked away.

I looked _up_. My eyes were wet.

So many stars. The universe so vast.

_We’re s- so very small, in the end._

The first bullet hit me from behind, where my mask offered no coverage, and I slowly toppled. The second hit me before I could fall, before there could be any pain. Then I heard two small thuds from something hitting the ground.

As bad of shape as I was in, I could still lift my head and turn it, just a bit. The woman was standing up and moving away. She was _running_ away. There was a swirl of lights in the direction that she was heading for, a hole carved out of the air. I made a rasping sound and reached out to her, my hand shaking in my vision like I was on a rollercoaster.

Then she was gone and the hole, the portal was closing behind her. Leaving me here. The strength went out of my hand and it, and my entire body, slumped back onto the chair I had been left on. I panted for breath, even as- I felt- this is- what’s happening-

  
*******

Lisa shivered and drew her fur-lined coat closer to herself. In what even she would describe as a rare moment of empathy, she felt sorry for the roughly one half of Earth Bet’s former population that didn’t have fur coats or concrete buildings with heaters built in. The half that were still living in glorified tent cities as the wind howled outside and the snow blew. Pretty to look at but not to live in.

Well, they were all doing their part to make this new megapolis, name pending, into something that everyone (or at least everyone who survived this cast-iron bitch of a alternate New England winter) could live in. Even Lisa was doing her part and only expanding her web of contacts and influence and operations on the side.

Wincing as she pulled her hands out of her nice, warm pockets, Lisa grabbed at the nearest set of paper and started marking the memo. And thinking about how many people and groups she was going to have to send this to.

Everyone (mostly everyone, at least) might have been doing their part to get this city off of the ground, but that didn’t mean that they were all pushing together in the same direction. It wasn’t just Earth Bet’s surviving population that was living here, there were major enclaves from three other earth’s that had gotten devastated by Scion almost as badly as Earth Bet had. They couldn’t live on their Earth’s anymore, so now they were here. With their own languages and ways of doing things and organizations that had been shattered just as badly as everyone from Earth Bet.

To paraphrase… Machiavelli, possibly, America, China, France, were all just expressions of geography. The few surviving fragments of national or subnational governments ruled over nothing more than a few tens of thousands of people, with no higher standard of living than other groups and no interest in recognizing the other fragments as legitimate. Lisa had never cared that much about national identity that much, but she was starting to miss various agencies that already had clear lines of command and could get people who knew what they were doing to where they needed to be.

And the Wardens weren’t really stepping in to pick up the slack. They were worried about just how easy it would be to give up administrative power over the masses once they had it and Lisa _knew_ that they weren’t the only one. Also, Lisa was _extremely_ unimpressed at how slow they were to get their act together even on the topics that they wanted to control. She supposed that would make her life easier once things got back to normal and she could start to operate as a figure in the grey market, but Lisa would rather get there without a few million unneeded deaths.

Still, with half a dozen serious contenders trying to get the city, or large chunks thereof, under their thumb, they might not have a choice. After all, quite a few of those factions didn’t even have nice costumes to go with their heavy-handed brutality and corruption.

Sighing, Lisa started to annotate the memo, providing her thoughts and insights on the latest plan to try and get some more buildings up that wouldn’t kill the people who got to live inside of them. And after that… there was a whole lot more paperwork that she should take care of. And all for the warm glow of helping other people, since the currency (and lack there of) situation was one of the projects that she was advising on.

Lisa had just about finished the memo when the office door swung open so hard and fast that it bounced back and almost hit Aiden in the face. She looked up, one hand moving down to her belt as she saw his wide eyes and panicked expression.

“Tattletale!” Aiden gasped, waving one hand around, that was still clutching the portable radio. He was talking so loud that she couldn’t make out _what_ the radio was saying. “There’s a new Endbringer! And it’s moving around the city!”

Later on, Tattletale could remember that she swore viciously enough to make Aiden jerk back. But she couldn’t remember _what_ she had said. She could only remember thinking that this was probably the end. The _slightest_ bit of damage to any of the many, many fragile distribution systems that were keeping people fed, warm and healthy in this winter would be enough to start a chain reaction that would end in maybe one in twenty of the people in the city surviving.

She lunged across the desk and grabbed at the radio, making Aiden draw back with a gasp as an angry (and scared) woman a decade older than him lunged for him. Lisa managed to get her hands on the radio even as she pulled out her cellphone and started texting out requests for more information and a pickup.

“I can see the entity now,” the borderline-panicked voice of the reporter was saying. “It’s moving along Hansom Highway, its feet sending trucks shaking on their wheels with every step. It’s advancing towards the core of District Three and I don’t see-“

District Three. That was close enough that Tattletale could get there on her own. She switched to texting Lily and Rachel, getting them ready for a fight as she dug into her coat pockets for her keys. She glanced over at Aiden.

“Do you want to come on this?” She asked, wondering what his answer would be. And what she hoped his answer would be.

“I…” Aiden looked _very_ worried, his large eyes flickering back and forth.

“Just stay here,” Lisa said, not willing to spend any more time. “I’ll- I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

As Tattletale hurried out the door, she wondered if there were any crappier last words to say. But there was no time to go back and tell her… sidekick, her adopted son, her protégé, anything else. She had to get _going_.

New Brockton was actually one of the more developed parts of the megapolis, with two years of Earth Bet’s money building it up before Gold Morning. That meant that Lisa could drive on actual, good roads for a while as she flipped the small car’s radio to every possible station and heard the same half-dozen voices providing update reports on what was going on.

The monster was still advancing from some undetermined point to an undetermined point. It hadn’t started attacking yet, but it had still trashed a construction depot just by walking through it. Lisa wasn’t getting much more information that what the radio was providing her, since she was _not_ going to start using her power as she barreled down the streets a bit faster than was safe. She was already spending too much time trying to coordinate the rest of her team and getting transport for the dogs and the Heartbroken from Dragon.

Swinging onto the freeway and passing through a portal, Lisa arrived into the heart of the city proper, the Earth were most of the construction was really happening. And there the monster was. Lisa swallowed and pulled off of the road, the car’s wheels digging first into slush, then into snow. Lisa hoped that she didn’t have to run, because if she did, she would be _running_ , not driving.

The monster was huge, ten times taller even then Behemoth, breaking four hundred feet at least It was made in the image of a person, more so than most of the Endbringers, at least. A pretty stylized person, though, more than the Smirugh was. No face, just half a dozen large, slitted eyes arranged around the front of the head. There were thick black strands of what Lisa saw as hair sticking out of the monster’s head, slowly twitching, sometimes acting like they were tentacles, sometimes acting like they were multi-jointed legs.

The monster was swaying from side to side, its movements clumsy looking. Lisa winced as it brushed by a two story building that didn’t even come up to its ankle. The first step shattered all of the windows in the building and the next squashed it as flat as a bug as the foot landed on top of it. At least it was outside of the highrise district, or those wildly waving hands and arms would be carving an even bigger trail of destruction than what was actually happening.

Given how large the monster was, it looked slender, though Tattletale could only guess at just how thick the legs of the beast actually were. The monster had silver skin, that seemed to be lightly glowing in the snow that was flurrying around it. Over the limbs and chest, there was thicker, raised skin of dark grey. Armor, possibly. Or possibly something else. There was _always_ something else when it came to Endbringers.

If this _was_ an Endbringer. Lisa frowned, getting out of the car to get a better view. Her fingers drummed on the roof of the car as she stared up at it. It was _huge_ , even larger than the twins had been. And it wasn’t attacking. That didn’t mean much, not with how the Smirugh had spent so long singing before attacking. But…

Tattletale’s phone buzzed in the combination that meant that Dragon or Defiant was calling her. Just the person she wanted to talk to.

“Dragon,” Tattletale said in way of greeting. “Are any of the other Endbringers doing anything?”

“No,” Dragon said, seeming to agree with Lisa that this situation was too hurried for niceties. “They are all staying dormant in their locations, with no signs of movement or reaction to the current entity. I have a ship coming to pick you up, ETA fifteen minutes.”

“Right, I’ll keep you posted,” Lisa said, hanging up and studying the monster.

With a twinge of fear, Lisa realized that it had changed direction. That it was coming towards Lisa or the portal behind her now. She looked behind her and swallowed heavily. It had changed direction a few times before, but now it was on a straight line towards her. And those huge legs could eat up a lot of distance very quickly. Lisa looked down at the snow that went up to the hubcap of her car and then at the monster. Fifteen minutes would be too long.

Or maybe not. Off in the distance, small and tiny, Lisa could see some brightly-colored specks. One of the brighter specks had to be Legend, especially with the array of lines coming from him and hitting the monster. It didn’t do anything, including making the monster turn its head to look down.

Lisa could see more and more flashes of lights as more heroes were teleported in. The remnants of the old Endbringer response system proving their use, she supposed. She just wasn’t sure if they would be anywhere near enough.

Not even one of Dragon’s attack craft, that was hammering at the monster’s head with a distortion that made Lisa’s eyes hurt to look at. It was like they were fighting Behemoth all over again, the same futile attacks that couldn’t do anything to dissuade the beast from its target.

But at least nobody was dying. Lisa couldn’t see any signs of retaliation from the monster. There was just one long, slow step after another. The earth was starting to shake and Lisa winced as a group of half-finished buildings collapsed into themselves as the vibrations proved too much for them.

Was there any damage even being done to the monster? Lisa didn’t think so. She fished a pair of binoculars out of her glovebox and tried to focus on what was happening. It was hard. As tall as the monster was, there was just too much to take in all at once. And Lisa’s power wasn’t telling her much of _anything_ about what was going on. It was like there was a blindspot right there, like she was asking her power for information on the wind and snow instead of the largest creature to ever exist.

And now there was a haze developing around the creature. Lisa swallowed, too memories of gas flooding her mind. She wasn’t the only one. She could see a few heroes falling back, the ones who had been fighting at close quarters. But at least she couldn’t see any of them twitching and falling or any of the other, worse things that could happen to someone exposed to parahuman-derived gasses.

The monster seemed to shake and Lisa pulled the binoculars away to get a more encompassing view of what was going on. It had been rocked back, though it was so far away that Lisa couldn’t tell what had happened or who had done it. But still, checking the clumsy monster’s movements, even for a second, was a victory of a kind. But it was a long way from stopping this thing.

And finally, finally, finally, Dragon’s craft was coming in for a landing. It was a big, bulky construction craft, beetle-like with several segments and legs dangling underneath that still had steel I-beams strapped to the sides. But it could fly and the cargo compartment was hissing open. Lisa sprinted in the opening and swung a hard left to the cockpit.

There weren’t any kind of controls in there, only some informational readouts. Lisa started flicking through them, trying to find out which option would give her exterior sensors.

“What’s the situation?” Lisa asked, barely remembering to buckle in as the craft took off screaming towards the fight.

“No casualties,” Dragon said, her voice calm and cool and collected even as the readout said that another half dozen craft were inbound. “Teams are evacuating civilians, and there haven’t been any counterattacks or lethal defense measures enacted.”

“Really?” Lisa asked, frowning. “What was that gas I saw coming off of the monster?”

“Current code name is Titan,” Dragon said, “and it appears to be insects.”

That brought Lisa up sharp. She blinked and looked down at the small grill that Dragon’s voice was coming out of and then out the window as the craft slowly circled around the fight. Insects. Black hair. Dark armor. That was Taylor to a T. But…

“Taylor went through quite the growth spurt when she was with me,” Lisa said, trying to sound flippant and hating herself for how badly her voice was wavering, “and she never knew when to quit.”

“ _Is_ this Weaver, Tattletale?” Dragon asked, sounding insistent.

“I don’t know,” Lisa said, sighing and rubbing her forehead. “The aesthetics match up, more or less, but how do you go from even-,” Lisa swallowed heavily, “what she was to this?” She sighed heavily and drummed her fingers on the armrest. “I don’t know and my power isn’t giving me any insights, Dragon.”

“Understood,” Dragon said. “The other Thinkers are returning similarly blank results. If we begin communicating with Titan, will you be willing to talk to it?”

Lisa opened her mouth to dispute the word _it_ , but stopped herself. Instead, she nodded and sighed, sitting back in the chair and staring intently out the viewscreen.

“Yeah, sure,” Lisa said heavily. “Sneak a com-bead into her ear and I’ll jabber away.”

“We’re moving towards Acoustic, who will amplify your words,” Dragon said. “Stand by.”

Lisa opened her mouth to offer a flippant comment about what her other options were, though her heart wasn’t really in it. Then, for once, she decided that if she didn’t want to say it, then Dragon didn’t need to hear it. Instead, she studied Titan or the titan as it slowly walked forward.

It seemed to be aiming at the New Brockton portal. For now, at least. Dragon’s craft had circled about a third of the way around it so far and there hadn’t been any response. That thought struck a note in Lisa’s mind and she frowned down at the readouts.

“What about the insects?” Lisa asked. “Are they doing anything?”

“No,” Dragon said. “They’re making a perimeter of one hundred feet around Titan, but not reacting to any intrusions.”

Lisa nodded, watching two feeds, one of some brightly colored girl sending brightly colored outlines of herself into the bugs and another of some Shaker warping the ground to form a tunnel. Nothing happened to either of them.

“Alright, so it seems safe to send the brawlers back into the fray,” Lisa said musingly. “Assuming they can do anything.”

“There’s some debate right now about if that should happen,” Dragon said. “Would you like a link to the Wardens?”

“Not until I have something useful to share,” Lisa said quickly. A bit too much bad blood between her and the leadership of the Wardens for her to just pop on over to say hi. “Let me see…”

Lisa closed her eyes and started browbeating her power. It had always given her details that she didn’t really care to know, so now it was more than time for it to start talking and telling her what she needed.

And when Lisa opened her eyes, she got what she wanted. Too much, really. She winced and hastily pulled her barriers back up, cutting off the flow of information that could have burned out her mind if she had let it.

“Okay,” Lisa said, shaking her head and rubbing her forehead. “Okay, I’m getting some information.” She winced as she stared at Titan. “It’s, it’s not layered like the Endbringers are. It’s the same toughness all the way through, from skin to center.” She frowned. “There’s no core, either, like what Scion destroyed on Behemoth.”

“Can you tell what it wants?” Dragon asked. “Or what it can do?”

“Um,” Lisa said, wincing a bit as she debated how much of a migraine she was willing to accept versus being useful later on. “Give me a sec.”

“Of cour-stand by.” Lisa raised her eyebrows, wondering if this was good news or bad news. What was she saying? She already knew what kind of news it was, she just didn’t know _what_ the news was. “Acoustic is ready to work with you.”

Lisa nodded, wondering what kind of man Acoustic even was. She couldn’t remember ever hearing anything about him, so he either kept his nose down to the ground or he lived pretty far away. She’d get some more details soon enough.

The craft set down and the hatch opened. The cold winter air was like a slap to the face and Lisa shivered as she hurried out, wishing she had remembered to grab a hat before leaving, even if it wouldn’t go with her costume.

There were plenty of capes and other people in mismatched uniforms around, but Acoustic was pretty easy to pick out, with the large speaker icon pasted onto his chest. He was a skinny man, twice as old as Lisa but only an inch or two wider at the shoulder. He was hurrying to Lisa as well.

“Dragon said you might know something about,” he waved a hand behind him at the towering Titan. “All of this?” He had an almost comical Canadian accent but jokes about donuts and moose didn’t even enter Lisa’s mind as she nodded.

“Possibly,” Lisa said. “Or at least who this was based on.”

“Then let’s get to the front lines,” Acoustic said with a shrug. “Don’t want anyone in front of me when I start shouting.”

Lisa nodded and hurried after him, slipping through the dozen yards separating them from the brown and black crowd of insects that formed the perimeter. As Lisa jogged towards it, she sighed and shook her head. She had never really thought to see this from the other side.

“Okay,” Acoustic said, putting his hand on Lisa’s shoulder. She bridled a bit at the touch by a stranger but now wasn’t the time to make a scene. “Give it everything you’ve got.”

Lisa nodded and sighed. Her sigh came out about ten times louder than it should be. And the bugs a few feet away from her stirred, so it must be even louder in front of her.

Lisa opened her mouth and came up blank. If this was Taylor, what was she supposed to say? If this wasn’t Taylor, what was she supposed to do? Lisa never much cared for being at a loss for words but nothing was coming to mind right now.

“Skitter!” Lisa said, yelling and wincing as her too-loud voice banged against her ears. The insects in front of her were being dispersed as if a tornado was passing through the area. “It’s me! Tattletale! Remember me?”

As high up as the head of this thing was, could it even hear Lisa? Could it hear anything? Lisa had no idea but she kept on talking, even as she felt like a bit of an idiot, shouting this in front of everyone.

If Titan could hear what was being shouted, it didn’t care. Lisa looked up at the towering figure, wondering just what she was supposed to _do_ about this. If this was Taylor, she was far more Kephri than Skitter and nothing that Lisa had said to Kephri had made any difference.

Running a hand through her hair, Lisa sighed and tried to figure out what to say next. At least the other capes weren’t attacking. They were just setting up a perimeter around Titan, Shakers and Breakers warping the battlefield to hinder Titan and make things easier for people. Lisa had a feeling that it would mean as much as ants preparing traps for an elephant.

“Taylor?” Lisa called out. “Taylor, remember when we-!”

Lisa stopped talking. She didn’t want to, but she didn’t have a choice. Her mouth closed and her body stilled, as, behind her, Acoustic took his hand off of her shoulder, leaving it hanging limply at his side.

Everyone was doing the same. Lisa could see out of the corners of her eyes and could see maybe half a dozen capes stopping what they were doing and standing stock still, facing towards Titan. Just like she was. Her mind was aching with effort as she commanded her body to respond, to twitch even a single finger or take a single breath, but nothing happened. There was some other will at work, overriding Lisa’s with the ease of a river sweeping away a leaf.

Lisa remembered this sensation. Half a year wasn’t nearly long enough to forget it. She didn’t like it then and she didn’t like it now. And there was nothing to be done about it.

Nothing was being done _period_. It had been at least a minute already and everyone that Lisa could see was still just standing there, forming a vast circle around Titan. Behind her, Lisa could hear more people walking towards her, standing still behind her and pressing in between her and Acoustic. She didn’t recognize them.

And they weren’t doing anything, either. They were all just staring upwards at Titan, blinking and breathing in unison. Lisa was no different. All she could do was think and look and slowly freeze.

Lisa didn’t think that this was Taylor. It seemed that this was just a _thing_. Maybe it could ape Taylor’s costume and chose her powers over people and bugs instead of plants or anything else a shard could do, but that wasn’t Taylor. Taylor was more than just a collection of powers and abilities and Lisa wasn’t seeing any trace of that in any of this. There was just- control. Not even control with a purpose, just standing here, waiting for- something. Nothing. Who could say for sure?

Titan slowly, gracelessly, turned around, each heavy impact of its foot knocking capes to the ground like toy soldiers, Lisa included. Whenever that happened, they all climbed to their feet again, doing the same motions in the same way. Lisa could see a number of capes who she knew could fly, but they were just rising to their feet like a normal person.

She couldn’t see any sign of powers being actively used. There were a few heroes still in their Breaker state, a man of jade or a woman with a head of fire, but they weren’t _doing_ anything with those powers. If Titan could control powers in addition to bodies, it seemed that it didn’t care to do anything with them.

Titan stopped when it was facing Lisa. And a few dozen other capes, some of whom Lisa knew would have been known to Weaver. But- but Lisa had a feeling that Titan was regarding her in whatever way the being sensed the world. Those glowing yellow eyes were high up enough that swirls of snow were cutting the line of sight between them every now and then, but that obviously didn’t matter. Especially not if the bugs (still living and moving despite spending almost half an hour flying in the freezing cold) were telling everything to their mistress like Skitter’s had.

Lisa’s neck was starting to ache from being tilted so far backwards for so long. But she couldn’t get any relief. She had to keep on staring at the impossibly large head, far, far above her. There was no emotion in those half-circle eyes, at least no emotion that Lisa could read. They didn’t even blink.

Lisa strained to say something, to call out to Titan, even without Acoustic’s aid. But she couldn’t. Her hands hung limply at her sides and all she could do was stare upwards in- loss, gratitude, worship, whatever it was that Titan was getting out of all of this.

Tattletale was dressed warmly enough to survive out here until sometime in the middle of the night. But she was wearing a heavy coat over her costume and she had gloves. How many of the others, especially the men and women who were overly proud of their bodies, last for? Dying against Scion had been one thing. Dying while just standing and staring up at the impossibly tall form of Titan was another.

_Why_ was this happening? The whole reasoning behind Titan’s appearance and halted rampage was something that Lisa wasn’t willing to get into right now. But why _this_? Were they supposed to be worshipping Titan? Waiting for orders? Basking in its presence? Or was there no reason at all and this was just a broken machine trying to carry out fragmented orders for impossible results?

Behind her, Lisa could hear the whine of overlapping jets. Dragon. She hadn’t been affected last time and it seemed that she wasn’t being affected now. But what could she do against something that couldn’t even be hurt?

Lisa got her answer when she felt a claw wrap around her. Her head didn’t look down but she still felt herself getting lifted up into the air, the thundering roar of Dragon’s propulsion units behind her. Then she was moving away, up into the sky, feeling the cold air biting through her clothes. And she couldn’t even shiver.

Until she did. All of a sudden, the control fell away. Lisa gasped, hands flashing down to tug at the claw before the insanity of that washed through her brain. Lisa looked around. She was maybe forty feet up in the air, one of four capes dangling from the claws of Dragon’s craft. They were about half a mile away from Titan and now they were slowly descending.

“Tattletale,” Dragon’s calm, warm voice said from over some external speakers that Lisa couldn’t see. “Just to confirm, that was the same sensation as Kephri’s power, correct?”

“Yes,” Tattletale said in a heavy sigh as she turned back to Titan, seeing the people crowded around its base, staring up into the sky at it. “It’s her.” She sighed again. “Or what’s left of her.”

  
*******

  
There was a lot of work that needed doing, Lisa knew. And sooner or later, she would get around to doing it. But right now- right now the snow outside her window looked prettier.

It was too cold outside to wear her costume, even with the padding that Lisa had gotten Sabah to install. So Lisa was wearing her fur-lined coat and an ugly sweater and uglier pair of thick pants. And she was still feeling cold.

Lisa had a feeling that even if she was in the middle of the tropics, she would still be feeling cold. She drew her coat closer around herself and shivered and watched the snow piling up deeper and deeper on the nearly-empty streets outside.

There wasn’t a lot going through Lisa’s mind right now. And to think that there had been all those times when she had just wished for a bit of peace and quiet from her own thoughts, to shut all of that stuff _out_ and just be able to relax. But now that it was happening, Lisa felt alone. And she still felt alone even with Aiden or Imp or even Rachel and her dogs in the room.

The soft creaking of the chair was the only sound in the room as Lisa swiveled back and forth in it, turning around slightly as the same few tired thoughts chased each other around inside of her head.

Was that Taylor? She, or it, hadn’t reacted to Lisa. Hadn’t reacted to Dragon, either, and Lisa had heard that they had gotten pretty close during her time in the Wards. So if it wasn’t Taylor, then what was it?

The leading theory as of last night when Lisa had gone to bed, was that it was connected to her shard. That maybe the titan had been her shard, appearing out of nowhere to walk the earth. If so, then it seemed like a cruel, cruel joke to Lisa that it could take Taylor’s color scheme, which had changed twice over in just two and a half years and not any of her memories. Then again, Lisa had a reminder of how nasty and mean powers could be every day for years now.

And it wasn’t like they could send drones in to get samples of it. Shortly after night fell, Titan had vanished into thin air. Why it had done it, where it had gone… who knew. When would it come back? Again, nobody knew the answer to that.

It had just vanished. Would it appear again one day? Would it seek out someone like Lisa? Or, and this was a thought that Lisa didn’t much care for, would someone else’s shard appear? Someone who’s power was a lot less survivable than controlling bodies? There had been a lot of people with very nasty powers who had died during Gold Morning and Valkyrie hadn’t gotten anywhere close to all of them. Was Lisa going to be getting a call about a massive, invulnerable monster who turned people’s bodies into lead next?

Lisa had thought and thought about that sort of thing ever since she had gotten out of bed this morning. No, she had been thinking about it in bed as well, staring up at the dark ceiling and wishing for something to change.

Nothing had. There hadn’t been any priority messages waiting for her and Lisa hadn’t been able to bring herself to check the routine information for anything interesting. She had just gotten dressed, eaten half of her breakfast and sat down in her office.

She could use someone to talk to, but Imp was somewhere off in one of the corner worlds, Rachel wouldn’t understand and Aiden was too young. And her employees were her employees, even if some of them had costumes and cape names. So Lisa just had to think to herself about all of this, wondering and waiting and thinking about what had happened. Both two days ago and two years ago.

Behind her, the door opened. Lisa sighed and waved her hand.

“Not now, Aiden,” Lisa said tiredly. “I’m not in the mood.”

There was no answer and Lisa heard footsteps. She supposed she should go for the gun in her pocket but- instead, Lisa turned around in her chair to see who it was that was coming after her.

It was Taylor. Long, dark hair, covered in white snow. It was Taylor. Face pinched, cheeks a bright red. It was Taylor. Looking back at her, eyes wide behind her glasses as her mouth opened and closed soundlessly.

Lisa stumbled to her feet, feeling her head whirling, even as her thoughts were kicked into gear. Was this Taylor? Was this a fragment of the titan, sent here to- mock Lisa, to corrupt her, to kill her? Was it some assassin who could change shape or make Lisa see another’s face?

Lisa didn’t care. She took a step around the desk, her hand slack by her side as she looked into Taylor’s face. There was a wellspring of emotion there, too much to possibly be put into words as Taylor looked back at her.

“Taylor?” Lisa asked, the sound of her own voice startling her and putting her on firmer mental footing. “Is that really you?”

“H-hello, Lisa,” Taylor said, her voice a dry rasp. But it was Taylor’s. “It’s,” she swallowed again, “good to see you again.”

“Same here,” Lisa said, a contorted smile appearing on her face as she looked at her friend. “Brings back old memories, huh? Like when I killed Coil.”

It was hardly a subtle test but Lisa wasn’t up for anything cleverer. She didn’t know what she’d do if Taylor failed. Go for the laser pistol in her coat pocket, she supposed, if that would stop whoever or whatever this was.

“I killed him,” Taylor said. “With a pistol.” She frowned. “Or did I just cut them off from…” she trailed off and shook her head before looking back at Lisa. The expression on her face wasn’t quite a smile but it was the start of one. “And I almost killed myself coming here. Can I sit?”

“Of course,” Lisa said, some of the weight lifting off of her shoulders as she reached out for Taylor. “I don’t have any tea, but-!”

Lisa flinched backwards, rapidly retreating till her back was pressed against the window. She clutched her arm to her chest. When she had reached out for Taylor, her arm had started to move to another’s will. To Taylor’s will.

“Sorry, Lisa,” Taylor said softly, her voice a bit sorrowful but also with something else in it. “I’m more than this now.” She pinched the side of her neck. “It’s like the beat of my heart. It goes and goes and I’ll die if it stops.” She paused for a moment. “Or maybe it will stop if I die.” She lightly shrugged. “What’s the difference?”

“Right,” Lisa said quietly, looking down at the floor and sighing heavily. Then she looked back up and did her best attempt at a smile. “Well, we’ve never been much for touchy-feely anyway. We can work with this.”

Taylor nodded as she sat down at the chair across from Lisa’s desk. Lisa ran her eyes over Taylor’s body again. Taylor looked wrung out, exhaustion clear even through the ill-fitting winter clothing she had on, gloves over both hands. There were more lines on her face than Lisa could remember from last time and her eyes didn’t seem quite as bright.

But it still was Taylor. Lisa let her power off the leash just a bit to check, lowering the walls that separated her waking mind from a barrage of information that would leave her clutching her head in pain. It was for less than a second and Lisa snapped the barriers back up before any irrelevancies could start to sneak in.

It was Taylor but it was also her shard. How close were they together? Could they be teased apart or was that asking like the right side of the body to separate itself from the left? Lisa had no idea, but she supposed that there were plenty of would-be experts who would love to have the chance to find out.

“How did you get here, Taylor?” Lisa asked, carefully studying Taylor’s face as she started to get over her earlier shock. “This isn’t good weather to be out walking in.”

“I came here,” Taylor said, an emotion so faint that Lisa couldn’t even identify it bleeding through her voice. “It… took a while.” She smiled but it looked to Lisa like a half-baked computer animation instead of one of her friend’s rare smiles.

“Well, I,” Lisa paused, feeling like the world was shaking itself to bits around her. No, no, she knew what that felt like and as weird as this was, it wasn’t _actually_ that. “I don’t keep tea on hand anymore, but I can whip something hot to drink for you.”

“Thank you, Tattletale,” Taylor said, sitting back in her chair.

Lisa looked at her and made a snap decision. She walked over to the door to the rest of the compound (and she was going to be having _words_ with her guards about how Taylor got in without being seen, as happy as she was to have what was probably her friend back) and turned to look at Taylor over her shoulder.

“Come on,” Lisa said. “There are more comfortable places around here to be in than the punishment chair. Let’s head down to the kitchen, okay?”

“That sounds fine, Lisa,” Taylor said, rising to her feet in a way that didn’t seem quite right, though Lisa wasn’t able to put her finger on what, exactly, looked out of place about it. “Who normally sits in the ‘punishment chair’?”

“Oh, people who’ve screwed up or I have over a barrel,” Lisa said dismissively, waving her hand. “When I’m talking to someone I like, I walk and talk.”

“You’re still so active for a woman of your age,” Taylor said in a voice so dry that only the words told Lisa that her friend was making a joke.

“Try that comment again in twenty years when I might start to care,” Lisa said with a smirk. She turned and walked backwards for a few steps, studying Taylor. “You look a lot like those publicity photos the Wards put out, so I’m guessing what, seventeen, eighteen?”

“Probably,” Taylor said with a shrug. “How can you tell without prior records and a doctor?”

Lisa nodded, wondering if it would be worth tracking down Riley or Incubator for an expert opinion. No, not unless Lisa started seeing signs that this wasn’t actually Taylor.

“You know,” Lisa said, as they stepped into the kitchen, “if I was asked to bet on this sort of thing, I’d have said that your agent would have taken a snapshot of you when you were as close to it as you could be.” Taylor nodded along. “But, uh,” Lisa’s talent for words deserted her and she just tapped her arm.

“Yeah, I have both arms and they work just fine,” Taylor said, staring down at her hands and clenching them. “I don’t know why. I don’t know how I ended up in winter clothing, either, or why the shard could figure out winter clothing but not clothes that _fit_.” She pulled the ends of her coat up over her hands again.

Lisa nodded. She had her own ideas about why the agent might have done that, based on how Lisa had to fight with her own power to get any uplifting, positive information about anyone she studied, as opposed to an instant list of the most disgusting and hurtful things they had ever done. But she stayed quiet as the hot water started to heat behind her.

“I’ve got coffee and I’ve got what’s supposed to be hot chocolate,” Lisa said, pulling two mugs down. “Which would you like?”

“Coffee, I suppose,” Taylor said with a faint expression of distaste.

“Sure thing,” Lisa said, reaching back up and getting the _good_ , pre-Gold Morning coffee down. “Don’t have any sugar to add, though.”

“Plain coffee?” Taylor said, making a much more obvious face. “I’ll stick with just hot water, then.”

“If you say so,” Lisa said, opening up one of the sealed packets and storing the other one away in the back, where nobody would idly find it.

A short while later, Lia and Taylor were sitting across the table from each other. Lisa was giving Taylor a series of long, searching looks, trying to figure out everything that she possibly could about her friend, how she had come back and the inevitable ways that this could go wrong.

The first way had already occurred to her. Taylor, with even a subdued form of Kephri’s powers? Lisa was okay with that and maybe half a dozen other capes would be as well. For everyone else… death, imprisonment, exile, people would be arguing for all of that. And not just _advocating_ for their favored option, either. And Lisa didn’t have the power or the allies to fight off the world.

Part of her mind was mulling over how to keep both her and Taylor safe. Another part of her was running over a list of experts on parahumans and their powers, both academic and capes. There was obviously something _off_ about Taylor and that might just be the surface layer. Who knew what could be wrong underneath?

“You’re being quiet,” Taylor said, breaking into Lisa’s thoughts as she lifted her mug and took a sip of the hot water. “The world really _has_ changed.”

“Very amusing,” Lisa said, rolling her eyes. “I was wondering about how many people I should be telling about you.”

“You didn’t- no, I don’t need you to worry about that,” Taylor said with a small smile. “Everyone’s going to know.’  
Lisa stared at Taylor for a long minute, dread starting to creep over her. She pulled her phone out of her coat pocket but there weren’t more than the usual amount of emails and messages needing her attention. She looked back at Taylor, who still had a bit of a smile.

“Taylor, what did you do?” Lisa asked, not able to keep her apprehension out of her voice.

“Well, nothing yet,” Taylor said. “But the other part of me is going to be keeping you safe, Lisa. I can’t do it on my own, but don’t worry.” She reached over and took Lisa’s hand. Lisa shivered as her arm and part of her body slipped from her mind’s grasp. “Nobody’s going to be able to harm you. She’s going to arrive really soon and then- then you’ll see.”

Lisa stood up, clutching her hand to herself, feeling sweat starting to form on her body. She went to the kitchen window, already expecting to see a massive form on the horizon, clumsily striding towards her and her compound in massive steps.

“T-Taylor,” Lisa said, swallowing heavily around a sudden blockage in her throat, “listen, Titan is Public Enemy Number Two right now, okay? It showing up on my doorstop isn’t going to be making me any safer.” Especially if it took control of her again, as well as Snuff, Aiden and everyone else, cape or not in a three hundred foot radius.

“I know that,” Taylor said, looking faintly offended. “I’ll be on the portal between New Brockton and the rest of… actually, I don’t know what the city’s called.” She ended on an inquisitive note.

“Neither does anyone else,” Lisa muttered, rubbing her head. “Listen, that’s no better, alright? We _need_ that portal to stay open so food and gas and stuff keeps on coming through. We can’t live off of fish.”

“I’m not going to try and close it,” Taylor said, sounding faintly offended now. “I’ll make sure that everyone keeps on going back and forth, just like they should. I’ll just stop any capes from trying to slip through unless you give them the all-clear.”

Okay, how to talk Taylor out an idea she liked without Lisa making it obvious that she was doing so? She rubbed her forehead, trying to think of a way that wouldn’t result in a Tinker whipping up a short-term portal and sneaking a team of assassins in.

Lisa was starting to remember some of Taylor’s downsides as well as the upsides. It wasn’t a very nice thought to have, but it was still one that was coming to her. She took a deep breath and looked Taylor in the eye, removing her unneeded domino mask and fiddling with it.

“Taylor, okay, look at it this way,” Lisa said, trying to think of a proper way to frame the problems she was having, “does Titan _need_ to come by? I’m pretty certain that we can keep your presence here a secret. Just tell Aiden,” there was no look of familiarity on Taylor’s face when Lisa dropped that name, “maybe Imp… no, not Imp, just Rachel that you’re back, without blowing on a trumpet to announce to the world, worlds, what has happened.”

“Why not Imp?” Taylor asked with a frown. “Is she okay?”

“Last I heard, yeah,” Lisa said, “but she’s still playing Mom to Regent’s siblings and trust me, you do _not_ want to get their attention.”

Taylor shrugged at that and Lisa dragged herself back on topic before she could innumerate all of the stuff that those hellspawn could do to someone who caught their eye.

“Taylor, I’m happy you’re back. I really, really am and I wish that I could give you a big hug, but Titan has sent pretty much everyone, including me, running around like headless chickens. We _can’t_ have it squatting on a trade artery.”

“Oh, don’t worry, Lisa,” Taylor said, smiling. “I think I can control my power and suppress it for long enough that people can touch me.”

Lisa stared at her, unimpressed. That wasn’t the problem Lisa was having. And Taylor should know it. Lisa dropped the walls on her power again, risking a headache this evening if she used it much more.

And Taylor didn’t really seem to get what was wrong with having her- shard, her other half, whatever the hell Titan was, squatting outside of New Brockton, looming like a skyscraper over the highway and railroads. Because it was big and powerful and what couldn’t it stop, right? Lisa was reminded of the arguments over keeping Shatterbird, though that had been so long ago that she couldn’t remember who had been arguing for what.

“Listen, Taylor, at least… learn a bit about what’s going on before you bring in your other half to stand guard, please,” Lisa said. “I’m touched that you want to protect me, I really am.” And Lisa really was, but just like you couldn’t go through life wearing armor half a meter thick, Titan would cause more problems than it would solve. “But you don’t really _know_ what’s going on around here, do you?”

“Well,” Taylor said, looking down at the table and drumming the fingers of her left hand against the top, “I suppose so. Are you willing to teach me?”

“Oh yes, believe me, Taylor,” Lisa said, nodding and smiling, “I’ll be showing you everything you need to learn.” She snorted. “Just like old times.”

“Just like old times,” Taylor said with an almost-matching grin. “Though I shouldn’t be robbing a bank with you tomorrow.”

Lisa snorted at that and drained the rest of her black, bitter coffee. She was going to have to clear her schedule for the rest of the day and then get down to business. But she didn’t mind. Not even slightly. This was something that Lisa could have a _lot_ of time for, making sure that things went just _perfectly_.

Taylor was back and Lisa was going to make sure that things went right this time around.

* * *


End file.
